Nuri al-Said

Nuri al-Said (December 1888-15 July 1958) was Prime Minister of Iraq from 23 March 1930 to 3 November 1932 (succeeding Naji al-Suwaydi and preceding Naji Shawkat), from 25 December 1938 to 31 March 1940 (succeeding Jamil al-Midfai and preceding Rashid Ali al-Kaylani), from 10 October 1941 to 4 June 1944 (succeeding Hamdi al-Pachachi and preceding al-Midfai), from 21 November 1946 to 29 March 1947 (succeeding Arshad al-Umari and preceding Sayyid Salih Jabr), from 6 January to 10 December 1949 (succeeding Muzahim al-Pachachi and preceding Ali Jawdat al-Aiyubi), from 15 September 1950 to 12 July 1952 (succeeding Tawfiq al-Suwaidi and preceding Mustafa Mahmud al-Umari), from 4 August 1954 to 20 June 1957 (succeeding Arshad al-Umari and preceding al-Aiyubi), and from 3 March to 18 May 1958 (succeeding Abdul-Wahhab Mirjan and preceding Ahmad Mukhtar Baban).

Biography
Nuri al-Said was born in Baghdad, Ottoman Empire to a family of mixed Arab-Kurdish descent, and he enlisted in the Ottoman Army. He defected in 1914 and fled to Egypt. When the Arab Revolt broke out he became Chief of Staff to Emir Faisal. When the latter became King of Iraq, he was his chief adviser and virtual founder of the Iraqi Army. He was to form no less than fourteen governments as Prime Minister during the rest of his life. In 1942, he proposed a confederation of Middle Eastern territories (including a Jewish enclave in Palestine), but this was frustrated by constant inter-Arab tensions and the Arab-Jewish hostilities in Israel. The most important pillar of the Hashemite dynasty in Iraq, he was Prime Minister of the short-lived Arab Federation of Iraq and Jordan in 1958. He was captured and murdered in the coup of July 1958.